Freedom Song: Young Voices and the Struggle for Civil Rights

Freedom Song: Young Voices and the Struggle for Civil Rights — page 5
back Immediately local black university women and the NAACP began to organize They called for mass protest meetings By December 5 black residents of Montgomery had agreed to boycott the bus system meaning that they would refuse to ride the city’s buses at all until the unfair treatment ended The leaders of the bus boycott included many local ministers including the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr and the campaign started with meetings in the churches People at the meetings sang as a way of praying They sang to express their deepest feelings In the songs they connected with one another Their passion and commitment to the movement and to one another grew through the singing And just about one year after the boycott began they won segregation on Montgomery buses ended Back in 1956 as the bus boycott was nearing victory in Alabama a new minister came to the First Unitarian Church in Chicago His name was Chris Moore He was young and energetic He was a musician And he was also filled with the spirit of the civil rights move ment He believed deeply in the equality of all people and in the need to work for justice Chris Moore started a children's choir Chicago is a northern city so it did not have strict segregation laws like those in the South But Moore understood that this did not mean the city was inte grated Far from it Segregation in the South was enforced by law Segregation in the North was